A Journey Through Breast Cancer | By Kathy Baum

Is Vaccine Working?

Since the 1st shot of the vaccine, many things have been happening in my body. Yet the cancer has not been shrinking yet. The CT taken last Monday to see if there were blood clots in the chest showed that the biggest tumor went from 4.7cm to 5.1 cm, and others also increased in size. The doctor said this was to be expected and if the vaccine works, the tumors stabilizes or shrinks at earliest in two months.

I worried about brain metastasis when the vision loss happened though, the doctor said there was nobody who developed brain metastasis after participating the vaccine trial. This is good news!

If a patient has the brain metastasis, she/he is not allowed to be in the study. The reason is that the skull like a tight box, has not much room for the brain to swell with the inflammation as the result of the immune response to the vaccine and because of so, it could be serious.

As the inflammation is a necessary process of the healing, I am not sure if we can call it a side effect. Yet the inflammation in the lungs can cause not only pains and coughs but also fluid accumulation. My lungs also have accumulated fluid, which is a cause of the cough and the shortness of breath, according to the doctor. I may need to withdraw it at the next visit. Medical sites say that the procedure is safe and simple taking about 15 minutes or so with a local anesthesia, but what if I cough during the procedure? I am nervous already.

Chemotherapy is hard on the body, but the vaccine is not an exception, either—I am learning. Anyhow this is the option I chose. Believing that God is with me, I have to keep moving.